The running back, Brandon Jacobs, is 6-foot-4, weighs 250 pounds and runs the 40-yard dash in 4.4 seconds. The backup quarterback, Jared "The Pillsbury Throwboy" Lorenzen, is also 6-4 and weighs in at 285 pounds.

If the rest of the Giants were proportional in size to Jacobs and Lorenzen, then they would have to be actual giants. As frightening as that may be to imagine, it's not as scary as the freakiest G-Men, who are very real and quite dangerous.

Defensive ends Michael Strahan and Osi Umenyiora each have a rare combination of size and speed, qualities that place them among the most fearsome pass rushers in the league. They also benefit from the rare coincidence of being elite pass rushers on the same team, a happenstance that has tortured opposing offensive lines to the tune of 52 sacks, the most in the NFL.

Strahan, the NFL's active leader in career sacks (141.5), is one of the best rushers of all-time and has nine sacks this season. Umenyiora, who is fourth in the league with 13 sacks, is one of the best rushers of right now.

Each could be considered the Mack of Sack, but keep in mind that fellow lineman Justin Tuck, (nicknamed "The Freak" at Notre Dame), sizes up at 6-5, 274, and has 10 sacks of his own.

Together, they anchor a defensive line with Barry Cofield that could be the greatest threat to the Patriots' Super Bowl hopes. Why? Because they have the best chance of eluding New England's Pro Bowl offensive linemen and hitting Tom Brady in a dangerous manner.

If you don't believe that, ask Donovan McNabb. The Eagles quarterback was the victim of 12 sacks in an October game against the Giants, six from Umenyiora alone.

Thanks to a blitz-heavy scheme from first-year defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo, the Giants have a reputation for bringing extra men. But with so much talent up front, Patriots head coach Bill Belichick said they can create pressure and get to the quarterback without help of a blitz.

"They get (sacks) off blitzes, but they can rush," Belichick said. "Those guys — Tuck and Osi and Strahan, they don't need any help. ... They create negative yardage in both the running game and the passing game, and then they get you in long yardage and it's hard to convert. And they're a good third-down team. ... They have plenty of sacks and plenty of pressure on three- and four-man rushes, if that's what they want to do."

The Giants' defense has also devastated opposing ground games, stopping more opponents for a loss than anyone else in the league. Patriots fullback Heath Evans said that will present issues for New England's backfield.

"They're big and physical," Evans said. "Our offensive line is going to have a huge challenge, but I think our running back group is going to have a huge challenge of getting the ball down there and trying to manage runs. Not look to pop big ones, but to get to three or four yards and keep us ahead of pace on down and distance."

Evans said his own responsibilities may be a little different this week. Instead of looking for the defender he's assigned to block, he said his first responsibility will be finding defenders who beat their blocks so he can correct the mistake.

"They get upfield," Evans said of the Giants linemen. "I think for me (the key) is awareness this week of maybe not even being so much focused on my guy but really to be aware to correct mistakes. They've got a great defensive line, they've got big linebackers — they get a paycheck too. They're going to create errors, so I've got to be ready to be able to adjust and do my part to get this running game going."

As Brady and Randy Moss chase down a pair of touchdown records — passing and receiving, respectively — the Patriots will need to pick up New York's hard-charging front if it wants to move the ball in the air.

"You can't have a passing game if you can't protect the quarterback," Belichick said. "So protection is definitely an issue in the passing game. There is no doubt about it. ... They give you a lot of different looks, they make you work hard in the passing game to protect and to get open and throw it. We will have to do a good job in every area to have any kind of success at all in the passing game, there is no doubt about that."